Publication Date:
2011-03-12
Description:
T-shaped molecules with a rod-like aromatic core and a flexible side chain form liquid crystal honeycombs with aromatic cell walls and a cell interior filled with the side chains. Here, we show how the addition of a second chain, incompatible with the first (X-shaped molecules), can form honeycombs with highly complex tiling patterns, with cells of up to five different compositions ("colors") and polygonal shapes. The complexity is caused by the inability of the side chains to separate cleanly because of geometric frustration. Furthermore, a thermoreversible transition was observed between a multicolor (phase-separated) and a single-color (mixed) honeycomb phase. This is analogous to the Curie transition in simple and frustrated ferro- and antiferromagnets; here spin flips are replaced by 180 degrees reorientations of the molecules.〈br /〉〈span class="detail_caption"〉Notes: 〈/span〉Zeng, Xiangbing -- Kieffer, Robert -- Glettner, Benjamin -- Nurnberger, Constance -- Liu, Feng -- Pelz, Karsten -- Prehm, Marko -- Baumeister, Ute -- Hahn, Harald -- Lang, Heinrich -- Gehring, Gillian A -- Weber, Christa H M -- Hobbs, Jamie K -- Tschierske, Carsten -- Ungar, Goran -- New York, N.Y. -- Science. 2011 Mar 11;331(6022):1302-6. doi: 10.1126/science.1193052.〈br /〉〈span class="detail_caption"〉Author address: 〈/span〉Department of Materials Science and Engineering, University of Sheffield, Sheffield, UK.〈br /〉〈span class="detail_caption"〉Record origin:〈/span〉 〈a href="http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/21393540" target="_blank"〉PubMed〈/a〉
Print ISSN:
0036-8075
Electronic ISSN:
1095-9203
Topics:
Biology
,
Chemistry and Pharmacology
,
Computer Science
,
Medicine
,
Natural Sciences in General
,
Physics
